


Why we fight

by Izamania



Series: A thousand lies and one truth [3]
Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-09
Updated: 2019-03-09
Packaged: 2019-11-14 10:38:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 737
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18050921
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Izamania/pseuds/Izamania
Summary: Just a short ficlet about Finrod and Beor.Its set before the whole Lúthien mess





	Why we fight

He had watched them. At first he had thought they were orcs, but he was mistaken.

They weren't elven, dwarven or orcish - at least they bore no scars and their eyes were not the solid black that was seen with all of Melkor’s creations.

They were shorter than the elves, some of the tallest only reaching his shoulder. They had none of the twisted, warped life that orcs had, or the strange pain that wore down the Feanorians and their allies. They had no great skill with metal, cloth or gems and had only primitive armour, leather jerkins and a little chainmail, clearly of elvish make. The weapons the bore were crude, there was no beauty about them, none of the effortless grace that elvish weapons possessed or the strangely solid and purposeful beauty of that which the dwarves created.

 

He had called them the edain, the second people.

Sure, they might be the third race, but dwarves were created before the elves- they were creatures of Aule not Iluvatar.

 _They_ called themselves Men.

 

They had such _short_ lifespans, it was strange that they still got up and went on with the day despite the knowledge that everything they would ever do was all for nothing.

One in particular had stood out to him. Beor or Balan as he had been known.

He had only lived for ninety-three years, then had died, but he had been a friend. It was not in their own strange ways that he was fond of them, but it was their own innate strength and passion that had given him the push to be fond of them, even when all others had gritted teeth and scowls upon hearing about the new race.

 

As much as he loved his cousins, he couldn't stand how the sons of Feanor saw them as more troops to join their cause, the Nolofinweans were politely uninterested and his advisors could not understand what good they did, refusing to fight in a war that they were all a part of.

 

But Beor, oh, he had been incredible, marching his _clan_ miles out, following a light they couldn't see and fleeing from an all consuming darkness that they would speak no word of.

  


Finrod had always felt isolated from the others; his brothers spent as much time with each other as possible and his sister was obsessed with being better than everyone else. His cousins never really noticed him, the son of the forgotten prince, the unremarkable one. His father was not the proudest, the cleverest or the most stunning, and thus, Finrod was just a shadow.

Certainly, in Valinor, he had close friends, people who liked him for him. He was friends with Maedhros and Fingon, but they had always been friends- more than at times, and he was always the outsider.

 

Beor was different, the men were different.

 

He had asked, once, why they fought, Beor had responded with:

“I fight so that my children's children, and their children don't have to. Why do you fight?”

Finrod had no answer for that. Elves saw themselves as priorities. They were immortal after all. Children were an experiment, a political statement or a student. They were not necessary, they were an afterthought, nothing else, and Finrod sometimes felt that all too keenly.

 

He wondered how the children of men felt, these strange tiny infants who had no clear intellect, were they proud of their fathers, or did they think nothing of it, that it was the parents duty to be just that, a parent.

 

In Valinor, more often than not, parents were often absent, absorbed in their own studies and lives. But these humans, why did they protect their children, was it due to their short lifespans and dull minds, or was it something else?

 

All he really knew was that Beor was the closest friend he had ever had. He was an ally and would listen as Finrod spoke of all his earthly grievances.

 

So he had ignored all that his councillors said and chose to swear himself to protect those of Beor’s line and those that carried the ring he had gifted to Beor.

 

He has been warned that it would be his doom, but he did not renounce it. Beor had been his friend, and if he could do nothing  else, then at least he could try to keep the children of his closest friend safe.


End file.
